American Missionaries in Yokohama

Noriyoshi Kobayashi

Yokohama, one of the most important port-cities in Japan, has been the

gateway to Western civilization, and the base of missionary activities since the

opening of Japan's seclusion at the end of the Tokugawa period (1603-1867).

Just after the port of Yokohama was opened in June, 1859, some Christian

missionaries came, and stayed in Kanagawa, three miles away to the east of

Yokohama beyond an inlet, because Kanagawa was designated as one of the

foreign settlements in the treaty of 1858 between Japan and the United States.

However, the Tokugawa Goverment regarded Yokohama, a small village at

that time, as a good port of defence for foreigners against Japanese attackers

rather than Kanagawa which was a resting place on the Tokaido Highway

near to the Capital Yedo, now Tokyo, where there were many anti-foreign samurai. Therefore, the Government intently built the foreign settlement in

Yokohama, insisting that Yokohama was a part of Kanagawa, but the treaty

powers•\Britain, France, the United States and Holland•\placed their con- sulates in some Buddhist temples in Kanagawa according to the treaty, and the missionaries stayed at two Buddhist temples there, too.

On October 17, 1859, Dr. James Curtis Hepburn (1815-1911) of the American Presbyterian Mission landed at Kanagawa, and stayed at the Jobutsuji Temple. He was born in Milton, Pennsylvania, studied Greek and Latin classics at Princeton University and medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. After his graduation, he left for China as a medical missionary in 1841, but because of his wife's illness, he came back to the United States in 1845 and opened a clinic in New York, where he worked as a successful doctor for fourteen years. Dr.

- 35 - 英学史研究第18号

Hepburn, however, could not give up his desire for mission work abroad, so he

closed his clinic and left for Japan.

On December 1st, 1859, two weeks after Dr. Hepburn's arrival in Japan,

Samuel Robbins Brown (1810-1880) of the Reformed Church of America landed

at Kanagawa and stayed at the Jobutsuji Temple, too. He also had had experi-

ence in mission activities in China. After his graduation from Yale University

and the Union Theological Seminary, he was appointed the principal of the

Morrison School in Hong Kong and served there from 1839 to 1846. But on ac-

count of his wife's illness, he had to return to the United States.

After that, he became the pastor of a church in New York. In 1858, a treaty

was made between Japan and the United States, in whcih Christain worship

would be permitted in the foreign settlements. The Reformed Church of Amer-

ica sent three missionaries to Japan in 1859. Two of them•\S. R. Brown and

Dr. Duane B. Simmons•\came to Kanagawa, and Guido Herman Fridolin

Verbeck (1870-1898), the other one, was sent to Nagasaki.

In Kanagawa, Dr. and Mrs. Hepburn lived in the main building of the Jobu- tsuji Temple, next to the Buddhist priests' living quarters, where Brown and his family lived. Dr. Simmons, as a medical missionary, lived in the Sokoji Temple in the neighborhood of the Jobutsuji Temple. These three missionaries began to study Japanese immediately in preparation for mission work in future. Early the next year, Dr. Simmons left the Reformed Church of America for some reason. It is said that his wife, a Unitarian, influenced him so strongly that he was forced to resign the missionary post. He moved his residence from the Sokokoji Temple to Yokohama Foreign Settlement, where he became a famous doctor in 'Semen-en', internal medicine for children. On April 1st, 1860, Jonathan Goble (1827-1898) of the Free Baptist Mission landed at Kanagawa and lived in the Jobutsuji Temple just as the two missionaries did. He had once come to Japan as a sailor in Commodore Perry's fleet in 1853 to see Japan with his own eyes for the purpose of becoming a missionary in future. Then he returned to the United States to enter a theological

- 36 - American Missionaries in Yokohama school where he studied theology and, after becoming a missionary, came to Japan again. At the Jobutsuji Temple, he lived in a small house but he did not keep company with other two missionaries. The three missionaries studied Japanese very well. Dr. Hepburn, about one year after his arrival in Japan, was able to read books in easy Japanese. He wrote in a letter, 'I have mastered almost all Japanese. Now I am making a

Japanese dictionary. I am reading some books in Japanese, awaiting the day when I can translate the Bible into Japanese.'

S. R. Brown said, 'As I did not understand Japanese, I could not tell the truth of Christianity to the Japanese people. Now I am learning Japanese to evangelize in Japanese, talking with one Japanese teacher about the doctrine of Christianity.' About that time, he was also writing a Japanese conversation book titled 'Colloquial Japanese'. Goble learned Japanese from Sentaro called Sampatch, a shipwrecked Jap- anese taken from the United States, but Sentaro was so unintelligent that Goble had a new tutor for learning Japanese. Dr. Hepburn and S. R. Brown began to translate the Bible into Japanese, individually from February, 1861 or so. They kept up with each other in speed and finished translating Mark in several weeks by using Bibles in Chinese. After that, they started translating John in May of the same year. From April, 1861, Dr. Hepburn opened his clinic in the Sokoji Temple which Dr. Simmons had left one year before. Dr. Hepburn's reputation spread in almost no time. Therefore, lots of patients came there, even from Yedo. He was very busy diagnosing one hundred to two hundred patients a day, but as the English Legation was attacked by several assassins in July, the Japanese Gov- erment restricted his diagnosing to patients who had Goverment certificates, so the number of the patients decreased remarkably and in September the clinic was closed. In the summer of that year, Mrs. Hepburn returned to the United States, because their only son, Samuel, did not make progress at college. Therefore, Dr.

- 37 - 英学史研究第18号

Hepburn lived alone at the Jobutsuji Temple, studying the Japanese language.

Dr. Hepburn, with his Japanese teacher, translated John, Genesis, and a part of Exodus by October, and then translated into Japanese, a small Chinese book '•^—•ˆÕ’m'•\'Shinri-Yichi' (Introduction to the Truth)•\written by Divie

Bethune McCartee (1820-1900).1) S. R. Brown also finished translating Mark,

John and Genesis, with the help of his Japanese teacher. Besides, he sent his manuscript of 'Colloquial Japanese' to a printing house in Shanghai, where he spent about three weeks overseeing the workmen, after going there in October,

1861.

On November 11th, 1861, James Hamilton Ballagh (1832-1929) of the Re- formed Church Mission came to Kanagawa as the successor to Dr. Simmons. He graduated from Rutgers College and the New Brunswick Theological Semi- nary. When he was a college student, he was called to became a missionary to Japan by S. R. Brown. At the Jobutsuji Temple, Ballagh and his wife lived in the main hall, where Dr. Hepburn lived alone after Mrs. Hepburn's return to the United States, and invited them to stay together, while S. R. Brown had gone to Shanghai. Every morning Ballagh got up early to go to a pine tree, called 'Hirao Naizen Monomino Matsu', on a hill one kilometer from the Jo- butsuji Temple and prayed under the tree for the future of Japan. He learned Japanese from Riuzan Yano who was a bald-headed temple doctor about fifty years old. Yano had been sent as a Japanese teacher to S. R. Brown from a minister of the Japanese Government. Ballagh was interested in Buddhism and studied the difference among Buddhist sects, and gained knowl- edge of Daimyo's stations from Yano, whom he tried to lead to the Christian faith by studying Japanese. On September 14th, 1862, an English merchant, Richardson, was murdered by some samurai of the Satsuma clan in a procession on the Tokaido highway at Namamugi near to Kanagawa. Richardson's friends were wounded, and Dr. Hepburn treated them. In the autumn of 1862, the Japanese Government trusted Dr. Hepburn with

- 38 American Missionaries in Yokohama nine students to be taught geometry and chemistry. They were more intelligent than American college students, so Dr. Hepburn taught them English at first. He expected them to make use of their high language ability in the future for Christianity. One of them, Zoroku Murata who was later called Masujiro Omura, became famous as m new leader in the Meiji Restoration. On December 29th, 1862, Dr. Hepburn moved to No.39 Yokohama Foreign Settlement. He continued to teach the students from the Government in his new clinic building, but because the Namamugi Incident was not settled between

Japan and Britain, the British fleet gathered in Yokohama harbour. The situ- ation in the settlement was so confusing that the students withdrew to Yedo in April, 1863. Dr. Hepburn began to translate the Bible again. Mrs. Hepburn came back from the United States to Yokohama in March and opened a small English school in the autumn. Among her pupils, there was Korekiyo Taka- hashi who later became prime minister and several other ministers. Takaha- shi was shot to death by some young officers in the February 26 Incident in 1936. David Thompson (1835-1915) came to Yokohama in June, 1863, to help with the mission work of the Hepburns.

S. R. Brown was asked to teach English at the Governmental English School in Yokohama from October, 1862. He and Ballagh thought that they would be able to live at the Jobutsuji Temple forever, but outside the temple there were rising waves against foreign powers. On midnight of May 30th, 1863, the American Minister came to the Jobutsuji Temple and asked them to retreat to the Yokohama Settlement because a large group of ronin (lordless samurai) might attack the foreigners in Kanagawa. On the dawn of June 1st, the two missionary families were forced to get on board an American warship and were taken to Yokohama. S. R. Brown rented a small house for thirty dollars a month. Ballagh lived in a Japanese-style house on the compound of the American Consulate and then moved to No. 167 Yokohama Settlement, the lot of the present Yokohama Kai- gan Church.

- 39 - 英学史研究第18号

Ballagh started the translation of John into Japanese with Yano in the sum-

mer of 1863. Using the Chinese Bible as a reference, Yano began to know the truth of the Gospel through the translation. He was suffering badly from tuber- culosis. Ballagh and his wife often visited him, and they prayed for his health

with his family present. Yano thanked the Ballaghs for their kindness. At last, he confessed his conversion to Christianity.

On November 5th, 1865, the baptism was held in a small house in a back street in Kanagawa, where Yano's wife and son were present. After Dr. Hep- burn's prayer, Ballagh baptized Yano, who became the first Protestant Chris- tian in Japan under the edict against Christianity.

The Ballaghs paid their last visit to Yano on Thanksgiving Day of that year.

Yano, sitting up, thanked them and said that he would tell God about their kindness in the heaven. On December 4th, about one month after his baptism,

he died.

From July, 1864, Dr. Hepburn taught English at the Yokohama Governmen- tal English School in the house of customs with S. R. Brown, Ballagh and

Thompson. He lectured every day and, though his clinic became much busier in 1865, he taught English one hour every morning. The next year, so many more patients came to his clinic that he became extremely busy, but he finished editing his Japanese-English dictionary'˜a‰pŒê—Ñ•W•¬' ('Waei-Gorin-Shusei')

September, 1866, and started for Shanghai to print it within Ginko Kishida, his assistant, in October.

Goble bought some land in the Yokohama Settlement and moved there in the spring of 1862. He began translating the four Gospels and Acts into Japanese in 1863 or so. He applied for support from the American Bible Society in 1866, in order to publish his translated Bible, but he could not gain the financial support from the Society. In 1867, he left Yokohama for Nagasaki, where he taught

English in the house of the Toss clan, and reutrned to Yokohama in 1868.

After Yano's death, Ballagh translated Luke, Matthew and a part of Mark with a person called Sosaku, but on November 26th, 1866, a great fire broke out

- 40 - American Missionaries in Yokohama

in the Yokohama Settlement, where all these manuscripts were burned along

with Yano's translated John.

Dr. Hepburn, in Shanghai, printed his Japanese-English dictionary, and

Shinri-Yichi' which had been wood block printed in 1862. In March, 1867, ' he came back to Yokohama and in the autumn of the same year he operated on

Tanosuke Sawamura's leg, a famous female-part actor in Kabuki, who appear-

ed on the stage with the first artificial leg in Japan. Therefore, Dr. Hepburn's

reputation spread throughout the country.

In April, 1867, before Dr. Hepburn returned from Shanghai, S. R. Brown's

house was burnt down by an accidental fire. The manuscripts of his translated

Bible and other materials were destroyed, but fortunately Matthew and Mark

had been lent to a Japanese friend of his. He returned to the United States in

May.

Dr. Hepburn, knowing that Goble had applied for support from the Ameri-

can Bible Society by himself, thought the Bible should be translated into Japa-

nese with the cooperation of all missionaries. He asked Ballagh and Thompson

for the cooperaton. Every day they polished his manuscript of Matthew on the

basis of Brown's. As the Yokohama Governmental English School was burned

down by the great fire in 1866, it was closed. The missionaries, having no

classes, were free but Dr. Hepburn opened his clinic daily, where lots of patients

from all over the country consulted him. Besides, he taught medical students in

his clinic, which was as busy as ever.

Ballagh, after the great fire of Yokohama in 1866, held church services in Dr. Hepburn's clinic chapel every Sunday. In 1868 he baptised Takaaki Awazu and Kanichi Suzuki who were students of the Yokohama Governmental English School, but about that time he and Thompson were so absorbed in preaching

the gospel and teaching English that the translation of the Bible was advanced by Dr. Hepburn.

In 1868, Dr. Hepburn finished translating Matthew and then revised it. In the summer of that year, Dr. and Mrs. Hepburn made a journey to Mongolia, Sa- - 41 - 英学史研究第18号 ghalin and Hokkaido for six weeks. In February of the next year, after they came back to Japan, he returned alone to the United States to report to the Mission Board, coming back to Japan after six months. While he was out of Japan, S. R. Brown came back to Yokohama with Miss Mary Eddy Kidder (1834-1910) in August, 1869. He went to Niigata with her to teach in the prefectual English school in October. In May, 1870, Dr. Hepburn completed the translation of Matthew, Mark, and John, which he gave to the other missionaries, and continued translating Luke, until its completion in August. In July of the same year, S. R. Brown returned from Niigata to Yokohama with Miss Kidder. In September he became the chief of the English department at the Shubunkan Academy in Yokohama under contract to teach for three years from 1870 to 1873. Miss Kidder helped Mrs. Hepburn in her small English school teaching only girls, with the purpose of founding a girls' school in Ja- pan. She later separated her class from Mrs. Hepburn's school and made the first girls' school in Japan, called 'Ferris School'.

In 1871 at No. 48 Bluff, the Mission Home was founded by three female missionaries of the W. U. M. S. The Home is the predecessor of the present Yoko- hama Kyoritsu Girls' School.

S. R. Brown revised the manuscript of Mark with Dr. Hepburn and finished it in the autumn of 1870. In November of the same year, Dr. Hepburn went to

Shanghai to print the second edition of his Japanese-English dictionary. Even after it was printed, Dr. and Mrs. Hepburn stayed there as their health had fail- ed, returning to Yokohama in July, 1871. In the autumn of the same year, Mark and John which had been translated by Hepburn, S. R. Brown and Masatsuna

Okuno were published in wood block print secretly under the edict against

Christianity. Okuno was Dr. Hepburn's Japanese teacher from the spring of

1871 and in August of the next year was baptised by S. R. Brown.

Goble also published in wood block print Matthew translated by him in the autumn of 1871, but it was confiscated by the Government soon. He translated

- 42 - American Missionaries in Yokohama hymns into Japanese, which were made public at the missionary convention after his return to the United States in 1871. In November, 1871, he returned to the United States in the same ship that em- barked Ambassador Tomomi Iwakura's group which was going to the United States for the revision of the treaty. Iwakura told him that the edict against Christianity would be abolished after the treaty negotiation. In May, 1871, Ballagh built a small stone house at No. 167 Yokohama For- eign Settlement. In the same year, he became an English teacher at the Taka- shima School which was founded as an English, French and German school by Kaemon Takashima, one of the most successful businessmen in Yokohama, but after a little while he left the post of teacher to his youngest brother, John Craig Ballagh (1842-1920) who came to Japan as a missionary of the American Pres- byterian Mission, and he taught English to some young men in the small stone house which was called 'the Sacred Dog-Kennel' by him, having no more than seventy students. There was no platform, so he put a table on the floor from which he preached to the young men. They were eager to learn English, and he talked about the Bible in poor Japanese but with fervor. The small house was destroyed by the Great Earthquake in 1923. The number of the students was less than twenty in the beginning, but later increased up to forty or fifty.

In February, 1872, the young men studying under him offered to hold New

Year Prayer meetings for one week, because they saw that the foreigners were

having such meetings in the settlement. The young men held the meetings, and

Ballagh also attended every day. There were thirty or forty at the most and

twenty at the least. The meetings were held three times a day, from 9:00 to 11:00

in the morning, from 3:00 to 5:00 in the afternoon and from 8:00 to 9:00 at night.

Probably there were some who attended the meetings out of curiosity, but the

atmosphere of the meetings often rose to such a high level that some were cry-

ing and some were speaking loud from excitement. Ballagh was surprised at the sight. The meetings did not stop even after one week and continued for three

months. Some of those attending later became new leaders of Christian activi-

- 43 - 英学史研究第18号 ties in Japan•\Masahisa Uemura (the first pastor of the Fujimicho Church),

Masayoshi Oshikawa (the founder of Tohoku Gakuin College) and Yoichi Hon- da (the second president of Aoyama Gakuin College), who were students of

Ballagh, attended the meetings, listened to his preaching and prayed with him.

On March 19th, nine men were baptized by Ballagh. On the afternoon of the same day, they elected Yoshiyasu Ogawa as Deacon and established the first

Protestant church in Japan, which was named 'Nihon Kirisuto Kokai' where

Ballagh served as the temporary pastor. At the dedication ceremony the Bal- laghs, the Browns, Miss Kidder and other foreigners were present, but Dr. and

Mrs. Hepburn did not attend it because they were in Shanghai printing the second edition of his Japanese-English dictionary.

One of the nine baptized was a spy from the Government who was a monk from a famous Buddhist temple in Kyoto and earned a monthly salary from the Government. On April 28th, the second baptism was held in the church, when six men were baptized. One of them was a spy from the Government, too.

In spite of such interference by the Government, the number of the church members increased to 119 in 1873.

On September 20th, 1872, at Dr. Hepburn's clinic chapel, the first general con- ference of the Protestant missionaries in Japan was held, when the New Testa- ment Translation Committee was organized, in which S. R. Brown was elected as the Chairman. The other members were Dr. Hepburn and Daniel Grosby Greene (1843-1913) of the American Board. In November, 1872, Dr. and Mrs. Hepburn returned to the United States by way of Europe. He published his translated book of John in the Roman alphabet and was granted Doctor of Law by La Fayette College the next year. They came back to Japan in November. While they were abroad, his translated Mat- thew was published in the spring of 1873. On February 24th, 1873, the edict against Christianity was abolished by the Government. Mission work was permitted outside foreign settlements. On Feb- ruary 7th, Nathan Brown (1807-1886) of the American Baptist Mission came to

- 44 - American Missionaries in Yokohama

Yokohama with Goble. Only one week after the abolition of the edict, he established the First Yokohama Baptist Church at No. 203 Bluff. Though he was sixty-five years old, he was much interested in Japan and had a strong interest in mission activities. Before coming to Japan, he did mission work in Burma and Assam for twenty-two years from 1833, when he completed the translation of the New Testament in Assamese, so he had the ability to master foreign languages. On arriving in Yokohama, he began to translate the Bible and hymns into Japanese. At first he held a Bible class for Japanese people, from whom he learned Japanese and to whom he taught English. Only three months after his arrival, he translated the hymn 'the Lord's Prayer' into Japanese, which was sung as the No. 1 hymn for a several decades in the Meiji period at Baptist churches in Japan. Goble's Japanese hymns were too crude to be sung for the first Japanese hymn, so Nathan Brown's hymn is said to be the first. In August, 1873, S. R. Brown resigned the post of teacher at the Shubunkan Academy after the completion of his three years' term. On December 5th, 1873, he opened a private school for theological education in his house at No. 211 Bluff. Some of his students in the Shubunkan Academy and all of Ballagh's students entered the school, which was the first theological school in Japan. Among the students, there were Masahisa Uemura, Yoichi Honda, Masayoshi Oshikawa, Kajinoshuke Ibuka (the second president of Meiji Gakuin College) and other persons who later played great roles in Christain work. In March, 1874, the second New Testament Translation Committee was organized. The first Committee in 1872 had not been functioning because Dr. Hep- burn was in the United States and Greene was in Kobe. The new Committee added four members to the previous members. The new members were Nathan Brown, Robert Samuel Maclay (1824-1907) of the American Methodist Episcopal Church Mission, John Piper (1840-1923) of the CMS and William Ball Wright

(1843-1912) of the SPG, but Piper and Wright did not join it because they lived in Tokyo, and Maclay did not join either, for some reason. Therefore, the other

- 45 - 英学史研究第18号 four members were responsible for the work. Greene moved from Kobe to Yo- kohama in July of the same year. They met at S. R. Brown's hosue four days every week, and worked from 2:00 to 5:00 in the afternoon, revising the manuscripts of the translated parts. In September, 1874, Dr. Hepburn established the first Yokohama Presbyteri- an Church at his clinic chapel, with Henry Loomis (1839-1920) as the temporary pastor. The number of the church members was eighteen. In the spring of 1876, Dr. Hepburn closed his clinic and moved to No. 245 Bluff, to devote himself to translating the New Testament. The clinic buildings and Mrs. Hepburn's private English school were transferred to John Ballagh. The school was called 'Ballagh School' which was moved to Tokyo in 1877 to become Tsukiji College , the predecessor of the present Meiji Gakuin University. In October, 1876, Dr. Hepburn moved the First Yokohama Presbyterian Church to Sumiyoshi-cho in the city. The church was renamed 'the Sumiyoshi-cho Church'. In January, 1876, Nathan Brown resigned from the Translation Committee, because he did not agree with the use of the Chinese word 'senrei' meaning 'baptism' and insisted on using the Japanese word 'shizume' more suitable for 'baptism'. As soon as he left the Committee, he began translating the New Testa- ment by himself, at his house at No. 67 Bluff, where two years before, in the spring of 1874, his son William had come and set up a printing press. His idea was that the Bible should be translated into pure Japanese on the basis of the original scriptures. In the same year he completed Matthew, the Letters of John, Jude and Peter, and the Japanese hymns 'Uta to Fushi'. In the next year he completed Luke and some Letters. In 1878, he completed Revelation, Acts, John and Hebrews. ln August, 1879, he finished printing his New Testament after completing Corinthians. This was the first complete New Testament translated into Japanese. Dr. Hepburn and S. R. Brown were in poor health for some time in 1878. S. R. Brown transferred his theological school to the United Theological Semi- nary which was newly established in Tsukiji, Tokyo, and he dedicated all his

- 46 - American Missionaries in Yokohama energies to the translation of the New Testament, but his health worsened, so in the summer of 1880, he returned home to the United States, where he died in Monson, Massachusetts, at the age of seventy on June 20th, 1881. In June, 1879, the Methodist Episcopal Theological Seminary opened at No. 221 Bluff.2) The founder was R. S. Maclay and the president was Milton Smith Vail (1853-1923). In 1882, the seminary was transferred to the Tokyo English

School, Tsukiji, which moved to Aoyama the next year to become Tokyo Eiwa School, the predecessor of the present Aoyama Gakuin University. In October, 1881, Martin Nevius Wyckoff (1850-1911) of the Reformed Church of America opened Senshi Gakko at No. 48 Bluff as a preparatory school for the United Seminary. In the first year thirteen students entered and in the next

year, thirty-two. Lots of students were baptized. In 1883 it was moved to Tsu- kiji to unite with Tsukiji College and became the United College, the predecessor of the present Meiji Gakuin University.

The New Testament Translation Committee finished all their work in Octo-

ber, 1880, with help of three Japanese assistants•\Masatsuna Okuno, Goro Ta-

kahashi, and Takayoshi Matsuyama. On April 19th, the next year, a celebra-

tion for the completion of the New Testament was held at the Shin-Sakae Church

in Tokyo, after the publication of Revelation in March. Of the manuscripts

which formed the basis of the Translation, S. R. Brown prepared those of Acts,

Philippians, Philemon, Galatians, Hebrews and Revelation, and Greene pre-

pared those of Colossians and John, and the others were Dr. Hepburn's.

In March, 1882, Dr. and Mrs. Hepburn went to Switzerland for his health. He

had been suffering from rheumatism for three years. A little after his return

to Japan in the next year, the Old Testament Translation Committee was organized by Dr. Hepburn, Greene, Verbeck and Philip Kemball Fyson (1846-

1928) of the CMS. The chairman was Dr. Hepburn, but Greene declined mem- bership, having returned to Kobe, so the other members were responsible for the translation. The Japanese members were Takayoshi Matsuyama, Masahi- sa Uemura, Kajinosuke Ibuka who left the committee later and Goro Takaha-

- 47 - 英学史研究第18号 shi as an assistant. Ninety percent of the Old Testament was translated by Dr. Hepburn, who concentrated all his energy on the work, though he was badly suffering from rheumatism. On February 3rd, 1888, the celebration for the completion was held at the Shina-sakae Church. Nathan Brown began to revise his translated New Testament just after the publication. He worked in his house, and once a week went up to Tokyo to preach in the church there. He never went more than twenty miles from Yoko- hama during his fourteen years in Japan. At his printing press, the translated New Testament and his hymns were printed only in the Hiragana alphabet at first, and with Chinese characters in them later. 15,000 copies of the New Testa- ment were sold in 1882in the Hiragana alphabet. In 1880, Miss Harriet Gertrude Brittan (1822-1897) of the Methodist Protes- tant Church Mission opened Brittan Girls' School at No. 48 Bluff, where the Mission Home had been moved to No. 211 in 1872. In 1881, the school was moved to No. 68 and then to No. 120 in 1883. In spite of the name of the school, boys were permitted to enter. Takeo Arishima, one of the famous novelists in mod- ern Japan, entered there as a boy in 1881. In 1896, the girls' department were transferred to No. 244 Bluff, where it was renamed the Yokohama Eiwa Girl's School, and in 1916, moved to Maita-cho in the city, the present campus. It was renamed Seibi Gakuen School in 1939. In 1884, the Yokohama Baptist Theological Seminary opened at No. 67 Bluff. The president was Albert Arnold Bennet (1849-1909). In 1894, the Seminary moved to No. 75, and after Bennet, John Lincoln Dearing (1858-1916) was appointed the second president in the same year. In 1910, it was transferred to Koishikawa, Tokyo, to unite the Fukuoka Baptist Theological Seminary and became the Japan Baptist Theological Seminary, which was transferred to To- kyo Gakuin College in 1918 and was united with Kanto Gakuin theological department in 1927. In 1887, Mrs. Nathan Brown opened a small girls' school at No. 67 Bluff after she took over six girls from Miss Clara A. Sands, a Baptist female missionary,

- 48 - American Missionaries in Yokohama who was to return to the United States in 1890. The school was taken over by Miss Clara A. Convers (1857-1935), because Mrs. Nathan Brown went to China after her remarrige. In 1891, the school was moved to No. 34 Bluff, and was named Soshin Girls' School in 1892. In 1913, it was moved to Nakamaru in the city, the present campus. From about 1885, Nathan Brown worked in bed on account of his poor health. Dr. Hepburn respected his high learning. Both of them were united in strong friendship. Dr. Hepburn often visited and treated him, but could not find any disease except overwork. Nathan Brown grew weaker day by day, and at last died on January 1st, 1886, at the age of seventy-eight. On January 4th, his fu- neral was held, at which Dr. Hepburn sang a song written by Brown. Dr. Hepburn, after the completion of the Old Testament in Japanese, was appointed the first president of Meiji Gakuin College in October, 1889. In Octo- ber, 1891, he resigned the presidency and in January, 1892, he completed the construction of the Shiloh Church at Onoe-cho in the city, where the Sumiyoshi- cho Church was moved. In June of the same year, he published the Bible Dic- tionary' with Hideteru Yamamoto. On October 22nd, Dr. Hepburn with his wife said farewell to Japan after thirty-three years and returned to the United States, where he died on September 21st, 1911, in East Orange, New Jersey, at the age of ninty-six.

Yokohama has been the stage for many missionaries' activities. They did mission work, translated the Bible, educated the youth, and performed many distinguished services in Yokohama. Their contributions to Japan should be greatly admired.

Notes

1) A medical missionary of the American Presbyterian Mission. He came to Japan in

1888, after working in China from 1884 to 1880.

2) Maclay purchased a chapel called 'Ten-an-do' which was built there by Goble, and

established the Yokohama Methodist Church on June 20th, 1875.

- 49 - 英学史研究第18号

Summary

Dr. J. C. Hepburn of the American Presbyterian Mission came to Kanaga- wa in October, 1859. S. R. Brown of the Reformed Church of America arrived there in November, 1859. J. Goble of the Free Baptist Mission landed there in 1860. J. H. Ballagh of the Reformed Church of America arrived there in 1861.

Those four missionaries stayed at the Jobutsuji Temple in Kanagawa and studied Japanese.

After moving to Yokohama, they were absorbed in translating the Bible into Japanese. Dr. Hepburn, as a medical missionary, treated many patients and made a Japanese-English dictionary 'Waei-Gorin-Shusei'. In 1865 Ballagh baptized Riuzan Yano, the first Protestant Christian in Ja- pan. He established the first Protestant church in 1872. S. R. Brown opened the first theological school in Japan, at the Bluff in 1873. Nathan Brown of the American Baptist Mission came to Yokohama in 1873. He published the first Japanese edition of the entire New Testament by himself in 1879.

Dr. Hepburn was on both the Translation Committees which translated the Standard Japanese New Testament in 1880 and the Standard Japanese Old Tes- tament in 1888. After the abolition of the edict against Christianity in 1873, many missionaries came to Yokohama. Some of them founded several schools there.

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